More than 800 people signed a petition calling for more permanent NYPD enforcement around Canal Street.

The concerns are illegal vendors, counterfeit goods and now drug dealing.

NY1 went to the area to check it out and captured very easily on camera what appears to be drugs being openly sold.

What You Need To Know

  • More than 800 people signed a petition calling for more permanent NYPD enforcement around Canal Street because of public safety and quality of life concerns

  • While Canal Street is known as a marketplace for knockoffs, the concern is an escalation of crime, including drugs being openly sold, muggings, and people defecating on the street

  • In a statement to NY1 in response to community members’ concerns, the NYPD wrote, “Officers assigned to the 1st Precinct, 5th Precinct, and Patrol Borough Manhattan South are addressing this condition along Canal Street daily. In the past month, NYPD personnel have conducted targeted operations in the vicinity of Canal Street. As a result, officers have made multiple arrests, issued many summonses, and confiscated numerous pieces of property, including a quantity of drugs”

Canal Street is famous for bargains and infamous as a marketplace for knockoffs, despite the NYPD and federal authorities trying to curb the counterfeiters and even promoting that enforcement effort on social media.

Now, business owners and building owners say they’re worried about a different kind of crime on Canal.

“Drug use, muggings, people defecating on the street — it’s filth, and it’s crime that spans way beyond just the illegal vending of handbags in the neighborhood,” Mark Elman said. “The number one concern is safety.”

Elman manages a building in the neighborhood with more than a dozen tenants — some of whom say they are terrified.

Employees of a clothing store on Canal Street tell NY1 vendors are ruining the brick-and-mortar business.

One worker said vendors threatened her after she called the cops. She said someone was shot a few doors down a few months ago, fights break out regularly and drugs are openly sold.

Elman and others believe the city is not prioritizing their problems.

“The city doesn’t seem to want to change that, and I don’t know that they’re going to change that, but the rest of the crime is hiding in the masses, they are hiding in the crowds, so when you allow a little bit of crime, it leads to more,” he said.

In a statement to NY1 in response to community members’ concerns, the NYPD wrote, “Officers assigned to the 1st Precinct, 5th Precinct, and Patrol Borough Manhattan South are addressing this condition along Canal Street daily. In the past month, NYPD personnel have conducted targeted operations in the vicinity of Canal Street. As a result, officers have made multiple arrests, issued many summonses, and confiscated numerous pieces of property, including a quantity of drugs.”

Officials also said that major crime is down in the area.

And last year, the now deputy mayor of public safety talked about fighting crime on Canal.

“Everyday New Yorkers [that] gotta walk down Canal Street, and be accosted, and harassed by these illegal vendors,” Kaz Daughtry said.

A Citizen app video showed vendors running from what appears to be a police raid earlier this year.

But residents and business owners counter that they quickly return and illicit activity typically ramps up less than an hour after each enforcement effort.

“The NYPD is our first course of action. They are the first responders in this. And if it’s not a consistent presence, it won’t be solved because they will be there for an hour, they will leave, and the crime will be back,” Elman said.

Elman said he manages several residential buildings, and he’s seen this pattern of crime escalate and climax before in other areas.

He fears Canal Street will only become the priority he believes it should be for the NYPD after someone dies.